Doormats Must Explore To Get Off The Floor

MANAGING YOUR CAREER LONA O'CONNOR

Since my last column on the subject, a whole crew of doormats has written in, asking for more advice, so let's see if we can change you from doormats into flying carpets.

Doormat-ology

First, a review: You are a doormat if you work harder than others but receive less recognition - and you are fed up.

Doormats also can get a lot of work dumped on them by other people. That's one of the reasons doormats work later than others. But whatever they are doing, what's more important is what they aren't doing: Doormats don't get ahead because they spend their time doing tasks that don't advance their careers.

A warning: Some of the advice below could be interpreted as cynical permission to do whatever the heck you please at work. That is not my intent. We all have a certain amount of drudge work and I am not suggesting that you wriggle out of work that is part of your job description.

You can, however, wriggle out of some of the tasks that have been dumped on you by others. But the key skill here is to rearrange your schedule so that you are doing the required drudge work as quickly and professionally as possible. Then you can spend more time on meaningful and challenging work that will satisfy you - and help you move on to a better job, if that is what you want.

Now let's talk about changing your doormat image. If you look like a doormat, by golly, people will walk on you. It's in their nature. Without even knowing it, you may be sending out ``doormat'' signals.

The first thing is to be clear on what you want. Remember I said, ``If you want a better job?'' It may be that you are not a climber, you just want to do your job and have the rest of the time free for real life. Nothing wrong with that, even in this shark-filled work world. You're not required to be ambitious.

In that case, your task is to do a swell job on what is required of you, dodge other people's grunt work and get out on time.

If you truly do have ambitions, however, you will have to put yourself in the line of fire for more work, different work, more challenging work.

Job smorgasbord

But let's say, just for giggles, that you're not sure what your ambitions are yet. If you're still flailing around, don't really know what's right for you, you can start by shopping around for projects. Think of this as tasting from a smorgasbord: no commitments yet, just testing. That will make it less intimidating.

This tactic works best in a large, diversified business, but no matter how small your company, people don't all do the same thing. Maybe you work out in the shop on a grinding machine, and you think you might be good at sales. You need to talk one of the sales reps into taking you along to call on some clients.

Depending on the situation, you might just observe, but that will not give you the best sense of the job. It would be better if you could participate, even in a small way. You need to know what selling feels like.

Out of the box

Now let's reverse the process: Maybe you've been working in the office as a file clerk, but you think you might want to work out in the shop. The idea here is to seek any opportunity for improving your situation, no matter how unconventional it might seem at first.

In some cases, you might have union rules to contend with, but with some persistence you could get a tryout, particularly if you happen to be a woman or a minority.

It could happen that your forays into different types of work make you want to retreat back into your comfortable doormat role, not challenging but very safe. I hope you don't give in to that impulse, but instead keep exploring, through the informal internships I've described, or through courses, or volunteer work.

No matter if you're starting out or stuck on a job plateau, no matter how scary change may seem, you doormats owe it to yourself to climb up off the floor and fly somewhere better in your career.

(P.S. If you want to look up the previous column on doormats, or any other subject, check the Sun-Sentinel's Digital Edition at [www.sun-sentinel.com/money) or keyword: DEMOney on America Online.)